ABSTRACT
Why did British cultural studies receive such a small echo in French academia while they had borrowed a lot from French intellectuals (Althusser, Barthes)? On the British side several reasons can explain this Francophile orientation: the reaction against the ruling American functionalism in social sciences, the absence of a “grand theory” in Germany or Italy, and the myth of the French intellectual. But the striking issue here is the almost complete absence of the reception of cultural studies in France (even if this situation deeply changed after the 2000s). How can one explain it? A mix of parochialism and arrogance clearly existed. The mapping of the disciplines matters too. There is no space for autonomous “cultural studies” when French sociologists and historians pay a great attention to culture(s). Strange as it may seem, the strong articulation between political commitment and academic creativity, typical of cultural studies, was not so usual in the French left intellectual world. A last explanation could be found in the location of the institutions such as the EHESS-prestigious but lacking resources to expand in the network of French universities-where something like French cultural studies could have developed.
